Wild horses are shown in temporary holding pens after capture. RTF file photo.
The Bureau of Land Management plans to begin capturing and removing 2,075 wild horses and 425 burros from Nevada rangelands starting on Sunday.
The BLM is removing the animals from the range because their numbers exceed the agency’s own population targets, called “Appropriate Management Levels.”
Instead of using helicopters, the BLM plans to use a bait-and-trap method in which wild horses and burros are lured with water or feed into temporary enclosures made of livestock panels.
Return to Freedom’s goal is to see wild horses and burros stay on the range, where they belong, but we are more supportive of using the bait-and-trap over helicopters. Any trapping of wild animals carries safety risks.
Unfortunately, the BLM announced no plans to treat and release wild horses or burros with proven, safe and humane fertility control.
If implemented correctly, fertility control could replace the BLM’s decades-old practice of ceaselessly removing wild horses and burros from the range then putting them in off-range holding facilities at ever-greater expense.
The four bait-and-trap roundups set to start this weekend are the first being conducted to attempt to control herd numbers since last fall’s government shutdown. Some have been conducted for what the agency deemed emergencies, like drought conditions.
Wild horses and burros are often outnumbered by privately owned livestock even on Herd Management Areas designated for them.
At one place affected by these roundups, the 1.6 million-acre Triple B Complex, for example, the BLM has set a population goal of 482-821 horses while permitting up to 7,269 cow-calf pairs to graze there annually.
Affected Herd Management Areas: Triple B and Antelope Complexes (Elko and White Pine Counties), Caliente Complex (Lincoln County), Pancake Complex (White Pine and Nye Counties),Spring Mountains Complex (Clark County).
Highway safety was also cited as a reason for removing wild horses from the Spring Mountains Complex. Tourists are known to feed horses along highways there, habituating them to people.